NZ networks fixed by Spark after earthquake

Communications services have been restored by Spark on the South Island, following an earthquake in New Zealand that disrupted service.

Most customers with Spark mobile, broadband and landline connections are now able to access their service again.

“The Spark team, our contractors and our partners have been working round the clock getting things back up and running. Work that would normally take a couple of months to complete has been delivered in a week,” said Mark Beder, Chief Operating Officer at Spark Connect.

“They have dealt with some pretty challenging circumstances, including landslides, unstable land, broken cables, toppled cell sites, lack of road access to sites and a range of terrible weather conditions.”

All Spark cell sites in the Kaikoura and North Canterbury area are up and running again. Broadband and landline connections in and out of Kaikoura have been restored, although there are still some localised issues. These involve 88 Spark broadband customers in Kaikoura and Clarence, relating to damaged Chorus local network equipment, as well as 241 Spark landline customers, affected by a damaged cabinet. Customers from other providers could be impacted by the same issues. A fix is urgently being worked on by Chorus.

The earthquake damage to the South Island east coast fibre cable meant that a number of telecommunications providers, including Spark, faced challenges as our back up connectivity options were reduced.

Spark South Island landline and broadband services were reliant on the integrity of the western cable, which runs from Blenheim and Nelson down to Christchurch via Greymouth. Vodafone’s South Island landline and broadband services were reliant on the integrity of the Aqualink submarine cable, which runs from Wellington, to Kaikoura and on to Christchurch.

To provide both Spark and Vodafone with back-ups in case of failure on their remaining cables, the two companies worked together to share cables. This was a task of some complexity and involving some risk, as each company made changes to its primary source of connectivity. The work has now been completed.